Densho Digital Archive - Aya Fujii - Taka Mizote Interview (denshovh-faya

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RP: So what... in the first few days you got there, what chores or responsibilities did you have? Did you do any of the cooking or did you --

TM: Our sister-in-law did the cooking, huh?

AF: Yes.

TM: 'Cause we all... see, whatever groceries we needed there was a camp director and I think they were the ones that took orders, you know, our grocery orders and things. Because we had no way of going, we had no transportation. But then the farmers would come and there would be crew bosses and so the crew bosses would say, "Well, this farmer needs so many workers," and so we would kind of go where our friends would go and go with them. So in that way it made it, you know, so all these farmers lined up and like the crew bosses would assign, say this farm needs so many workers and this farm next. Isn't that how it went?

AF: Well, I was too young to go with other kids, I mean, so I had to go with Mom and that was a bunch of old ladies. And I was probably the only young one but by then I was a sophomore in high school age.

TM: See Dorothy and Rose never did --

AF: They never had to work so my sister-in-law took care of them back at the tent.

RP: You go to Portland in May and then by June you're out in the camp, in the labor camp, so you're there during the summer, there's no school. Was there any type of security, fences or sentries or anything?

TM: No.

AF: No, but I'm sure that there were strict rules. I remember going to movies, just the camp people could go to the movies certain hour.

RP: Movies where?

TM: At the theater.

AF: At the theater.

TM: In Ontario.

AF: And I remember midnight movies, it started at midnight. And came home at two, three o'clock in the morning, you know, I remember that very clearly.

RP: Obviously, no curfew.

TM: No, because, see, it was not the, you know, zone one and zone two, we were in zone three I think where there was given more freedom.

RP: Tell me a little bit more about your experiences going out to these farms and how you were treated, what the work was like, what you got paid if you recall.

TM: I think that our crew bosses got the pay, you know, and then doled it out you. But we would go out in open trucks and stand for miles and going with the farm, you know, at that time when I think about it at times, my gosh we rode miles in an open truck, going to the farm and either hoeing beets or hard labor, believe me. [Laughs] But with your friends it's not as hard, you know what I mean?

AF: But they closed the schools in October for the potato harvest, I mean, they close the school for at least two weeks so everybody harvested the potatoes. And to me that was the hardest job in the world.

TM: Oh, gosh you talk about --

AF: You put this big belt on and hook sacks on the back, you know, like twenty sacks and you get paid by the sacks. And these sacks were like sixty pounds of potatoes and you put it like this and you pull up the sack and you stand it. So the truck can come by and pick it up. I can't imagine we did that.

TM: We worked hard.

RP: What did you have in terms of bathrooms? Was it sort of a communal bathroom situation in the camp too?

AF: Yes.

TM: Yes, but not as... there was I think... was it flush toilets in --

AF: No, at the tent there was two latrines right out... I mean, you could smell the chemical that they used. Then we had a big outdoor covered shower but the men had to go in at one time and the women another time and they were scheduled. But I remember just pulling this string, you know, on this platform thing that, you know, with slats and you pulled this string.

TM: To get the water?

AF: To get the water. But you had to hold onto the string to keep the water going.

RP: Just to clean yourself with --

AF: Yes.

RP: Boy, some interesting challenges.